Glinka and the Russian Five: Part I

Gareth Curtis

Michael Glinka

The history of Russian music has often involved a tension between home-grown and imported music. Rarely has this been more true of the 19th century, when a new and very deliberately national style was cultivated, first by Glinka and then by the so-called ‘Mighty Handful’, Balakirev, Borodin, Musorgsky, Rimsky-Korsakov and Cui. The first part of this course will explore the beginnings of Russian romantic music as we see it now in the work of Glinka. We shall then move on to the music of Balakirev, the dominating influence on the group, and the more familiar achievements of Alexander Borodin, an extraordinary character who was a research chemist by day, but moonlighted as one of Russia’s greatest composers.